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A Good Read A Good Listen and A Good Drink: Kris Bowers

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It’s a simple yet sublime pleasure, and just thinking about it can make you feel a little calmer, a little more content. Imagine: You bring out one of the good rocks glasses (or your favorite mug or a special occasion tea cup) and pour a couple fingers of amber liquid (or something dark and strong or just some whole milk). You drop the needle on the jazz platter (or pull up a blues album on your mp3 player or dig out that mixtape from college). Ensconcing yourself in the coziest seat in the house, you crack the spine on a classic (or find your place in that sci-fi paperback or pull up a biography on your e-book reader). And then, you go away for a while. Ah, bliss.

In this series, some of NTSIB’s friends share beloved albums, books and drinks to recommend or inspire.

Kris Bowers is a Julliard grad twice over (undergradate plus a master’s degree in jazz performance with a concentration in film composition), winner of Thelonious Monk International Jazz Piano Competition (2011) and has performed at both the NEA Jazz Masters Awards Ceremony at Lincoln Center (2012) and on Watch the Throne (2011) by Kanye West and Jay-Z.

He’s also just released his first record, Heroes + Misfits. It features him at the head of a sextet that includes alto saxophonist Casey Benjamin, tenor saxophonist Kenneth Whalum III, guitarist Adam Agati, bassist Burniss Earl Travis II, and drummer Jamire Williams.

This is Forget-Er, featuring Julia Easterlin, one of four guest vocalists who appear on the record:

As a bonus, here he is with his version of Kendrick Lamar’s Rigamortis:

Kris Bowers - Rigamortis (Kendrick Lamar Cover)

After I listened to his songs, I wanted to get to know him better. So here he is now, to tell us about one of his favorite books, records and drinks:

Photo by Janette Beckman

Photo by Janette Beckman

A Good Read:

It’s funny. Ever since high school, I’ve been drawn mostly to non-fiction books. At some point, I decided it was a waste to spend time reading something, and not “learn” anything in the process. Needless to say, that was among many of my assured lifestyle declarations as a naïve young adult. But, one of the most influential works I read during that time was a collection of Ralph Waldo Emerson essays, specifically one called Self Reliance.

In it, he essentially talks about the importance of being an individual, and not killing that search for your individuality because of your adoration and imitation of idols. It was really eye-opening at that point in my life, especially as a young jazz musician. It seems like, at times, you’re taught to aspire to be just like the greats, although you’ll never be “as good as them.” So it just made them all more human to me. As a matter of fact, my only tattoo is from that book: “imitation is suicide.”

A Good Listen:

Jimi Hendrix, Band of Gypsys. It’s of course hard to pick just one album, but that’s what I’m feeling right now. It’s easily one of my favorite albums of all time. Actually, once, when I was on a flight with some really bad turbulence, I turned on this album and thought “I’d be totally fine if this were to be the last album I ever heard.” Maybe a little dramatic…but I forgot about the turbulence.

http://youtu.be/VtJSWIv91eE?t=2m

A Good Drink:

I’m a whiskey man. Scotch, Bourbon, Irish, Japanese…my preference really varies based on how I feel that particular day. But for now, since it’s SO cold in NYC right now, I’ll say Booker’s because that’ll warm you up in no time.

A glass of good whiskey (neat or with one ice cube at the most), a good book and a good album, sounds like the perfect evening for me. Sometimes I feel like I’m really a 65-year-old man caught in a 24-year-old’s body haha.

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A Good Read a Good Listen and a Good Drink: Sivan Gur-Arieh, Everyone is Dirty

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It’s a simple yet sublime pleasure, and just thinking about it can make you feel a little calmer, a little more content. Imagine: You bring out one of the good rocks glasses (or your favorite mug or a special occasion tea cup) and pour a couple fingers of amber liquid (or something dark and strong or just some whole milk). You drop the needle on the jazz platter (or pull up a blues album on your mp3 player or dig out that mixtape from college). Ensconcing yourself in the coziest seat in the house, you crack the spine on a classic (or find your place in that sci-fi paperback or pull up a biography on your e-book reader). And then, you go away for a while. Ah, bliss.

In this series, some of NTSIB’s friends share beloved albums, books and drinks to recommend or inspire.

Everyone is Dirty is: Sivan Gur-Arieh (vocals/violin), Christopher Daddio (guitar), Tony Sales (drums), and Tyler English (bass). They are from Oakland, and they mix fuzzy aggression with pockets of sweetness to create some of the finest grunge out there. Here they are with the video for Mama, No!!!, their first single:

Everyone Is Dirty – Mama No!!! from Dalton J. Rooney on Vimeo.

A full-length record is expected in April, and they’re playing shows all over the Bay Area this spring. The next one is at Slim’s, in San Francisco, on March 7. If you’re in town head down and rock out with them.

Meanwhile, here is Sivan Gur-Arieh to tell us about one of her favorite books, records and drinks:

A Good Read:

The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym by Edgar Allan Poe

This is the story of what happens when your drunk-ass friend convinces you to jump into a random empty boat on the dock and go sailing in the middle of the night. I love Poe’s descriptions of storms and the stillness of the sea. Get tossed around in the ocean for a while and read the whole book here.

A Good Listen:

Histoire De Melody Nelson by Serge Gainsbourg

Mesmerizing music even though I can’t really understand what he is saying. Sonically they’ve got some amazing players on this. I’m in love with Herbie Flower’s bass playing and all of those psychedelic orchestral string arrangements by Jean-Claude Vannier. Um, and are you watching Jane Birkin dance in the movie version? This is a sexy fucking album. I must confess I’ve put it on to try and impress a boy ;)

Minute 11:05 of the video is especially fine:

Histoire de Melody Nelson – Serge Gainsbourg from LeGouter on Vimeo.

[ed note: you can also watch it on YouTube!]

A Good Drink:

Morning Sunshine! There’s nothing like an Italian Irish Coffee to set the right mood on a recording day, or any day for that matter. It puts together 2 of my favorite things . . . espresso and whiskey.

Italian Espresso

Johnny Walker Red

Whole Milk

Sugar

Whipped Cream

. . . add a few drops of Sativa Tincture for a dreamy work day.

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A Good Read A Good Listen and a Good Drink, Adam Turla, Murder by Death

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It’s a simple yet sublime pleasure, and just thinking about it can make you feel a little calmer, a little more content. Imagine: You bring out one of the good rocks glasses (or your favorite mug or a special occasion tea cup) and pour a couple fingers of amber liquid (or something dark and strong or just some whole milk). You drop the needle on the jazz platter (or pull up a blues album on your mp3 player or dig out that mixtape from college). Ensconcing yourself in the coziest seat in the house, you crack the spine on a classic (or find your place in that sci-fi paperback or pull up a biography on your e-book reader). And then, you go away for a while. Ah, bliss.

In this series, some of NTSIB’s friends share beloved albums, books and drinks to recommend or inspire.

Bitter Drink, Bitter Moon, the sixth record from Murder by Death, has pretty much everything I like: big roaring drums, delicate and occasionally super creepy string sections, and songs that double as good stories.

Such as Lost River – in which a husband begs a wife to drown herself to join him in the afterlife – for which they have made the dark and lovely animated video below:

Murder By Death - Lost River

They are, as we speak (type?), taking their show on the road, with sold out shows at the Mercury Lounge in New York next week, followed by stops in Baltimore and Cleveland. They’ll also be at the Wakarusa Festival in Arkansas in June.

Meanwhile, here is Adam Turla (vocals) to tell us about his current favorite book, record and drink:

Murder By Death, l-r: Matt Armstrong, Scott Brackett, Adam Turla, Sarah Balliet, Dagan Thogerson. Photo by Greg Whitaker

Murder By Death, l-r: Matt Armstrong, Scott Brackett, Adam Turla, Sarah Balliet, Dagan Thogerson.
Photo by Greg Whitaker

A Good Read

Last year I read Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves, and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History [by Robert Edsel] – a great book that turned into a pretty weak movie. The book is the true story of the World War II division of the US Military that was assigned to protect, locate and retrieve art stolen by the Nazis. I’m not usually a WWII buff, and I was shocked and horrified by the idea that Hitler was not only trying to eliminate a race of people, but also wanted to erase their culture and history.

And what was so fascinating and nightmarish (like the movie Brazil or something), he did it all by creating legislation that revoked the Jews’ right to own art, then had the Nazi state forcibly seize their property for “safekeeping” as part of a fever-dream vision of a massive museum full of looted masterpieces to be built in his hometown. What they deemed “too Jewish” or grotesque/modern (for example, Picasso) they would burn. An incredible read for both the terror and the triumph of crushing Hitler’s dreams of a shitty future.

A Good Listen

Lately I have revisited Massive Attack’s Mezzanine. It’s a wintery album that really gets you in a mood. The song that’s always knocked me out was Teardrop – kind of an obvious choice but I love it. Great record for sexy times.

Massive Attack - Teardrop

 
A Good Drink

Funny, I’m taking it easy on drinking this month. But lately I have enjoyed a Boulevardier, which is basically a Negroni with bourbon instead of gin. I love gin, but our drummer left a bottle of Ancient Age at my house and I’m happy to relieve him of it. It’s 1 1/2 oz bourbon, 1 oz Campari, 1 oz Sweet Vermouth, stirred in a tall glass with ice, then pour into a tumbler on or off rocks. Garnish with orange slice if you’re feeling like a fancy lad.

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Jesus Sons, Jesus Sons

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Jesus Sons

Jesus Sons began life in a motorcyle garage in San Francisco in 2011; the initial line-up was Brandon Wurtz and Shannon Dean with Rob Good and Ian McBrayer of Warm Soda. In 2013, Wurtz and Dean decamped for Los Angeles, and Chance Welton, Bert Hoover, and Erik Lake joined the band.

Jesus Sons, their first, self-titled record starts with a burst of bluesy harmonica that expands into a supple country-blues guitar riff, all of which caused me to sit back in my chair and smile in hopeful anticipation.

Ladies and gentlemen, I was not disappointed. If you like country-blues with ragged garage rock edges (all of them, but especially Ain’t Talkin’ Homesick) and the occasional burst of surfy shimmy (Out of Time) and/or suggestion someone may be conducting a punk rock exorcism (Melt/Going Down), you need this record in your life. Also, amid all the swagger, there’s a six minute instrumental – You Put a Spell on Me – which is, dare I say it, kind of sweet.

Here, as an enticement, is the video for All These Furs, in which they play a show at Salvation Mountain. It passes my “could I watch this with the sound off and still enjoy it/follow what was going on” test and also makes me want to be at the show, because those people look like they’re having fun.

Jesus Sons “All These Furs” A Carey Quinton Haider Film from carey haider on Vimeo.

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Mosey West, Bermuda

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MW_Bermuda_DigitalCov

Bermuda, the third release from Mosey West, of Fort Collins, CO, is named to reflect the spirit of change that has been driving the band for the last year or so.

First they changed their line up – the current crew is Adam Brown (guitar, vocals), Mike McGraw (bass, vocals), and newcomers Max Barcelow (drums, vocals) and Nathaniel Marshall (keys and guitar) – and then they changed their sound, pulling up most of their country roots and taking a flying leap into the world of psychedelic indie rock.

That might seem like a hard right turn, but the end result is more of a logical evolution than a complete re-invention. The changes have, if anything, given them more depth and warmth then they had before.

Now as for the tunes, I only say they’ve pulled up most of their country roots because there are still one or two left, which you can hear in songs like Old Stone:
 

But the psychedelia is clear and strong too, such as in Hurricane Eyes where they really jam it out:
 

For the rest, head over to their bandcamp page!

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A Good Read A Good Listen and a Good Drink: Lydia Loveless

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It’s a simple yet sublime pleasure, and just thinking about it can make you feel a little calmer, a little more content. Imagine: You bring out one of the good rocks glasses (or your favorite mug or a special occasion tea cup) and pour a couple fingers of amber liquid (or something dark and strong or just some whole milk). You drop the needle on the jazz platter (or pull up a blues album on your mp3 player or dig out that mixtape from college). Ensconcing yourself in the coziest seat in the house, you crack the spine on a classic (or find your place in that sci-fi paperback or pull up a biography on your e-book reader). And then, you go away for a while. Ah, bliss.

In this series, some of NTSIB’s friends share beloved albums, books and drinks to recommend or inspire.

No matter what state your heart is in – broken, full of longing, drunk in love, just drunk – it’s likely there’s a song for you on Somewhere Else by Lydia Loveless, due out on February 18. I’m particularly fond of Really Wanna See You; it’s a song for the end of a long night – what you should put on and sing along with instead of sending your ex a text you’re going to regret when you sober up.

And now here she is to tell us about her current favorite book, record and drink:

Photo by Blackletter/Patrick Crawford

Photo by Blackletter/Patrick Crawford

A Good Read: The Easter Parade by Richard Yates
You can expect anything by Richard Yates to be more than a little upsetting, but this book shattered my heart. I started reading it while staying at a friend’s house on tour, but couldn’t finish it before I left. I spent the next few days frantically searching for it in each town we stopped, and could think of nothing else until I found it. The story of two sisters for whom nothing goes right-or maybe everything goes exactly as it does for all humans-this is what it’s like to be a woman, told perfectly by a man.

A Good Listen: Ride the Lightning by Metallica

It’s tough to pick a “favorite album of all time” obviously, but I never get tired of this one (I’ll bet my band does, though…). It’s my favorite thing to listen to when I get mad and want to picture driving over people in a giant monster truck. Everyone does that, right?
 

Metallica Ride The Lightning

 
A Good Drink: I’ve been really into making carrot ginger apple (and whatever else I have lying around) juice in my blender. I don’t always get to be healthy on tour, so I find making a juice I can chew at home makes me feel oddly smug and Gwyneth Paltrow-ish.

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Songs That Stick To Your Ribs: Vol. 1

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Some songs come and go – sweet pleasures, but fleeting ones.

Others, they linger, wearing a groove in heart and brain that runs down the intersection of comforting and challenging.

These are some of those songs.

Off My Mind, Ryan Ross: It’s the plucked string at the beginning, I think. The insistent whang whang whang that reaches out to hook your attention just before the other guitars muscle in, rumbling and grumbling and trying to start a fight. And then about half-way through they settle down and start hammering out a quasi-hypnotic rhythm. I both do and do not want to know what the words are supposed to be; I’m curious, but also suspect context might ruin it.
 

 
If You’re in New York, The Grahams: I have more to say about Riverman’s Daughter, their most recent (and most amazing) record, but this is one of the songs I have been listening to obsessively. I have danced to this on subway platforms from Harlem to Brooklyn, and hummed along everywhere from the center of a swirl of autumn leaves on Central Park West to a rapidly thickening blanket of snow on 1st Avenue. It’s a country song, but it’s a got a city heart, and the city heart is full of joy.
 

 
Have a Cuppa Tea, The Kinks: From Muswell Hillbillies, but driven by the spirit of Village Green Preservation Society this is indeed an entire song about the role of tea in British society. I like to listen to it on my way to work while, yes, drinking a cup of tea.
 

The Kinks - Have a Cuppa Tea, 1972

 
Boys on The Radio, Hole: When Courtney Love is down, she’s down; but when she’s up, she’s radiant and ascendent and nothing can stop her. I am not going to lie, I wasn’t really a Hole fan back in the ’90s. But I’ve come to have an abiding love for Courtney Love in general, and this song in particular, and how it encapsulates how some of us are doomed to always love the boys on the radio, even if they are rotten to the core, and don’t love us any more. I also like to contemplate it as a counterweight to the Felice Brothers’ Radio Song; the other side of the coin, the darkness their romantic light chases away.
 
Hole--Boys On The Radio--Live @ Ottawa Bluesfest 2010-07-09

 
All My Things, SWiiiM: I like the build-up to the drops, the way the synths sparkle and shimmer, and then, whub whub whub, here it comes, trouble in paradise. I would have given all my things to you / I would have bought diamond rings for you. It was good, maybe, but now it’s gone bad. Maybe it was always a losing proposition, a missed connection that should have continued to be missed. It was better that way. Maybe.
 
SWIIIM - ALL MY THINGS - (DIRECTED BY CHRIS ACOSTA)

 
I Don’t Recall, Lavender Diamond: I just wrote about them last week, but I am bringing it back because the crystalline purity of Becky Stark’s voice is just that beautiful, and because this is another song I like to use to start the day. It is both wrenching and lovely, and – I am realizing just now – a song about heartbreak that is meant for grown-ups. If you’ve ever rolled over and realized half of you – your life, your plans, your feelings about important things like breakfast foods and appropriate places to sit at the movies – was abruptly missing, but you still had to fumble through your day and weren’t quite sure how to do it, here is a song to listen to while you figure it out.
 

 
Storm and Stress, Field Report: Go to a car. Put this on. Crank it up. Sit in the parking lot, watch the sun rise or set or the rain fall or the snow slowly pile up, and let it roll over you like a majestic steamroller.
 

We All Come to the Same Place, Rhubarb Whiskey: Because my people are the traveling kind; the ones who wander; who may or may not be lost, and if they are lost they probably like it that way; the ones who send me snippets of streetcorner moments, flashes of foreign trees, sunrises around the world, and more; the ones whose feet will never be wholly still; the ones for whom the roving dies hard.
 

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Lavender Diamond, Incorruptible Heart

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LDCLR

True confession: I downloaded Lavender Diamond‘s Daytrotter session because I was intrigued by their name. I didn’t even read the description, just snagged it because it was there and I could and why not?

That, as it turned out, was a A++ life decision, because Lavender Diamond is awesome. Halfway through the first song I was breathless and hungry for more.

Happily there is more; the Daytrotter songs were excerpted from their most recent record, Incorruptible Heart, which you can listen to in full on Soundcloud. (And then go and buy it from them right away, so you can wrap it around yourself like a warm aural blanket.)

The following are three of my favorite tunes:

First: All The Stars, because every time I listen to it, I hold very still, so I don’t break the spell cast by Becky Stark’s voice:
 

 
Second: Teach Me To Waken. The Daytrotter version is by necessity stripped down, and the piano dominates; on the record the drums roll and roar like the beating of a mighty heart:
 

 
And finally: I Don’t Recall, which is spare, delicate and devastating. I seriously do not understand why this is not the #1 crying-into-your-ice-cream song in the world right now. The video, directed by Jena Malone, captures it perfectly:
 
http://youtu.be/aL3Vv1hQW4Q

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A Good Read A Good Listen and a Good Drink: Bob Morris, The Hush Sound

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It’s a simple yet sublime pleasure, and just thinking about it can make you feel a little calmer, a little more content. Imagine: You bring out one of the good rocks glasses (or your favorite mug or a special occasion tea cup) and pour a couple fingers of amber liquid (or something dark and strong or just some whole milk). You drop the needle on the jazz platter (or pull up a blues album on your mp3 player or dig out that mixtape from college). Ensconcing yourself in the coziest seat in the house, you crack the spine on a classic (or find your place in that sci-fi paperback or pull up a biography on your e-book reader). And then, you go away for a while. Ah, bliss.

In this series, some of NTSIB’s friends share beloved albums, books and drinks to recommend or inspire.

Photo by Craig Seymour

Photo by Craig Seymour

In 2009, after three records and a lot of touring, The Hush Sound decided to take a break. That break lasted until 2013, when they reconvened to make more of their unique and delightful mix of power pop, folk and rock. As an example, here are two of their most recent tunes, Not A Stranger and Scavengers:
 


 

And now, here is Bob Morris (center, above; guitar/vocals) to tell us about a favorite book, record, and drink:

A Good Book
One of my favorite books is JITTERBUG PERFUME by Tom Robbins. It has many story lines that weave together and by the end they, of course, collide. My favorite story line in the book is that of Alobar, a ruler of a small tribe from prehistoric times. Alobar’s tribe doesn’t fear death, it’s a part of life. When you start to show your age, you are sacrificed and the next strong and able man takes over. Alobar, however, plucks his grays and when he is found out, he escapes. He meets the love of his long life and they meet some monks that teach them to live forever, through meditation. It’s an epic saga. It’s a beautiful love story and it weaves together ancient times with today.

A Good Listen
While I would argue that Stevie Wonder is the greatest music to listen to in virtually any situation, contextually, I think Marvin Gaye‘s What’s Goin’ On album is my favorite of all time. It was released in the late 60s on Motown and is the most ambitious of all Funk Brother’s arrangements. The themes of peace and forgiveness are both beautiful and empowering to any peaceful warrior. It’s an album that I can always listen to.
 
http://youtu.be/ph0aELhsQoc
 

A Good Drink
Intelligentsia coffee, man. Why are you saving ten bucks buying Trader Joe’s coffee when you could be living the high life with the good stuff. Just stop. You’re doing it wrong.

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WHOOP-Szo, Qallunaat/Odemin

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qallunaatodemin

Qallunaat/Odemin, the latest from WHOOP-Szo (this incarnation: Adam Sturgeon, Kirsten Palm, Gnathan and Starr Campagnaro), is a double album, recorded mostly in the village of Salluit, in the Québécois part of the Canadian Arctic, while Sturgeon and Palm were running a screen-printing program with Inuit youth.

The songs are, collectively, an odd but dazzling musical kaleidoscope. Here, you hold it, I’ll spin the wheel for you:
 
Amaruq (feat. Larry T) is the first song on Qallunaat, and is a low-fi pop song.
 

They’ve built their nests, in the chimneys of my heart; those swallows that you’ve lost is both the title and an appropriate summary of this delicate, sweet little song, also from Qallunaat:
 

Kirsten Time is the second song on Odemin and it is an eccentric, dreamy ambient delight limned with the perfect amount of distortion and fuzz.
 

And finally, Mirror North, the last song on Odemin which starts out – not boring, certainly, but – like the soothing routine of necessary tasks done against the background of snowscape – and ends in the unexpected cracking of the pack ice.
 

For the rest, stop by their bandcamp page.